Amazing Grace

So my last post about Uganda was not optimistic, but today the glass is looking half full.

Last night I was reminded that change takes time. Sometimes a long long time.

Some friends and I saw the movie Amazing Grace. I was encouraged. William Wilberforce spent his whole life advocating to end the slave trade- something that was a hot topic in British society at the time but nowadays seems so obviously evil and unjust and wrong. It took so long to change that... how much longer will it take us to fight against all the injustices that go unnoticed by most of the world (for example, 27 million people still bound by slavery)?

It will take a little while. It has already taken a little while, and there is still plenty of work to be done. But we'll press on and our small steps will add up and get us there eventually. We will, like Wilburforce, keep doing the work of the God who gives grace while we go about our careers and everyday lives. And we'll get discouraged and want give up but there will be people to pick us up and we'll keep fighting together...

An excerpt from Eat, Love, Pray by Elizabeth Gilbert:


"Here's another example of the difference in our worldviews. A family in my sister's neighborhood was recently stricken with a double tragedy, when both the young mother and her three-year-old son were diagnosed with cancer. When Catherine told me about this, I could only say, shocked, "Dear God, that family needs grace." She replied firmly, "That family needs casseroles," and then proceeded to organize the entire neighborhood into bringing that family dinner, in shifts, every single nihgt, for an entire year. I do not know if my sister fully recognizes that this is grace."